Pair campaign for lab-animal rights

Triangle scientists dispute claims

When poster-size pictures of deformed lab rats pop up in downtown Chapel Hill, expect to see Beth Levine or Missy Anderson-Cooper nearby.

Ditto when portraits of monkeys with bloody skulls turn up on Ninth Street in Durham.

Opponents of animal research have never held much ground in the Triangle region, where mice, rats, monkeys and other animals are test subjects of university and corporate research. Still, Levine and Anderson-Cooper dream of sparking a mass movement.

This fall, the women created Stop the Exploitation of Research and Animals in the Triangle. So far, 21 people have subscribed to its electronic mailing list. By staging demonstrations on the use of rodents at UNC-Chapel Hill and of monkeys at Duke University, they hope to attract more.

"Ideally, we would like for animals not be used for research at Duke and UNC-CH. We know that may not happen in our lifetimes. But the only way to start is to educate the public," said Levine, a preschool special education teacher in the Wake County School district.

Because the women oppose violence, they don't frighten university administrators as arsonist extremists have elsewhere. But UNC-CH and Duke, both accredited to use animals in research, say Levine and Anderson-Cooper distort how creatures get treated on their campuses.

Last month in Durham, the women set up a table on Ninth Street in Durham and handed out a flier criticizing Duke neuroscientist Michael Platt, something they repeated Sunday. They displayed photos obtained from a national animal rights group of a monkey with a bleeding head and another with a metal ring bolted to its skull.

One handout said that Platt implants screws into the skulls of monkeys in his lab so they can be "bolted" into primate restraint chairs and that "monkeys in laboratories live in a constant state of terror."

"That's patently false," said Platt, who studies the ways monkeys make choices and direct their attention in his laboratory.

Platt and Duke veterinarian Ron Banks said small screws and wires get surgically implanted in his monkeys' skulls under anesthesia. That allows Platt to keep their heads still during experiments intended to capture where they look and the firing of nerve cells in their brains.

But the monkeys can move their arms and legs and are visibly relaxed during experiments, Platt said. The research, he said, could offer insights into addiction and autism in people. Duke declined a reporter's request to see the animals.

In Chapel Hill in September, the women demonstrated on Franklin Street, showing photographs of mice with open sores and tumors obtained from video made by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. PETA workers have gone undercover in UNC-CH lab animal quarters twice in recent years.

In a handout, the group accused UNC-CH of abusing rodents and violating laws designed to protect them. It collected 158 signatures on a petition asking UNC-CH to stop research that force-feeds rats alcohol for studies on binge drinking. They "stand no chance of improving human health," the petition states.

In a written response to the women, UNC-CH Vice Chancellor Tony Waldrop said that the UNC-CH animal care program complies with federal rules and that many life-saving medical treatments for people grow out of animal studies.

Actually, a federal investigation started after PETA's most recent undercover visit, in the spring of 2004, found deficiencies that the university has since fixed, including delays in rodents receiving needed veterinary care such as euthanasia. Levine and Anderson-Cooper, a clinical speech pathologist for Lee County schools, intend to publicize such findings at future demonstrations.